By Jamie McGeever
BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazil's unemployment rate rose to a record high 14.6% in the three months to September, official figures showed on Friday, as the easing of COVID-19 social distancing and lockdown measures encouraged people to look for work again.
That was up from 14.4% in the three months to August, although it was lower than the 14.9% economists had expected. The unemployment rate at the end of last year was 11.0%.
The headline 14.6% unemployment rate was the highest since statistics agency IBGE's series began in 2012.
Underlying figures were also weak despite other data recently that showed record formal job growth and the economy continuing to rebound.
The number of Brazilians out of the workforce completely and the underemployment rate remained near record highs, while the number of people with jobs and the share of the working population in work remained near record lows, IBGE said.
The workforce of 96.5 million people was 1 million higher than the three months through August, but still 9.8 million or 9.2% smaller than the same period last year, IBGE said.
The number of people in work was 82.5 million, down 12.1%, or 11.3 million people, from the same period last year.
Only 47.1% of working-age people were working in the three months to September, IBGE said, down 7.7 percentage points from the same period last year.
Some 78.6 million people were out of the workforce completely, down slightly from the three months to August but up 21.2%, or 13.7 million people, from the same period last year, IBGE said.
The number of Brazilians officially out of work rose to 14.1 million, and the number of underemployed was 33.2 million, IBGE said. The underemployment rate was 30.3%.
Figures on Thursday showed that a record net 395,000 formal jobs were created in October. The dominant services sector, which had been hardest hit by social distancing measures, led the charge with a net 157,000 new jobs.